David's Disco: September
by x. Chaotic Bisexual Hottie .x
Summary: David loves birthday celebrations. As much as the responsibilities of a college student try to suck the life out of him, he resists by jumping on board his friends' "surprise" party wagon. Excitement escalates to new levels, things get out of control, and David realises just how much good staying in his dorm would have done. [OC-centric. First of the David's Disco series]
1. Chapter 1

September tenth, his birthday. David Parsons loved celebrating his birthday. When in his older teenage years, he celebrated his birthday twice: once with his mother and another time with his school's soccer team. With his mother, he refrained from wild celebrations to connect with her on a personal basis; as the only child of a single parent, he came to appreciate the closeness of a relationship and learned not to give it up for granted. But with his mates on the soccer team, all closeness faded the moment his sensory needs were met with the blasting music, the wild car-rides, and the smuggled alcoholic beverages. David was the kind of boy who could flip flop from his tender side to his raving crazy side and back at will.

But in college, David participated less in the pure energy of the atmosphere, as not only was he an athlete stretched past his limits during practice and games, but his Chemistry homework took whatever energy that was left and squashed it until he had no choice but to succumb to exhaustion around ten o'clock and fall into bed.

On this particular night, September tenth to be precise, David held a textbook open in his hands and sat cross legged on his bed. His eyes scanned over the same paragraph time and time again, hoping to understand a little better with each reread. However, the longer he reread, the more frustrated he grew with the swimming words in his mind's eye, completely unattached to meaning. His struggle to attach words to some meaning he did not have worsened his mood which worsened his ability to see the words on the page which worsened his ability to comprehend anything he still was able to see. He shut the book with a snap and hurled it to the ground. Its spine hit the tiles and its covers bounced open and the pages fanned out like a peacock's tail.

"Fucking chemistry," David growled under his breath. He glared at the textbook, hoping that by some twist of fate he would suddenly develop the powers of laser vision to incinerate the paper. Unfortunately for his mental health, no such powers manifested. Begrudgingly, David slipped off the bed onto his woollen socks to retrieve the textbook. He had homework to muster through, and even if it killed him (which he was certain it would), he wasn't going to slack off and go with the flow like he did in high school. The days of settling for B pluses were behind him; if he could put in the extra time to sharpen his soccer skills, he could afford to put in the same amount of dedication into his academics.

"All or nothing," he muttered to himself as he bent over to scoop the textbook off the ground.

His fingertips made contact with the book, and the door burst open. He scrambled to look up yet in his alarm ended up tripping over his own feet and landing on the floor. His elbow like a gong rang upon crashing into the floor.

"_HAPPY BIRTHDAY!_" a chorus of voices screamed. In charged a brigade of people, at least three college-aged boys, one of which made no hesitation to run behind David, grab his arms, and jerk him up to his feet. After a moment to find his balance, David gaped at the two in front of him and then circled around to gape at the one behind.

"Jesus Christ, Bradley," he said to the one at his six. "Tone it down, man!"

Bradley's face contorted into a devilish smirk. "What a lame kind of surprise party would that be?" he argued back.

"This," David said, circling his hand in the room to point out the entire situation, "is not surprise party. This is an ambush, is what it is. You ambushed me."

"Oh, come on." Bradley punched David in the shoulder. "Stop using fancy words like 'ambush' and whatever and start enjoying."

David frowned – since when had 'ambush' been considered a fancy word? – and mustered in a breath. He glanced back at the other two in front of the dorm door, which still stood open. They were also his teammates from the varsity soccer team, Wally and Diego. David released his brow from the frown he had condemned it to form. He straightened up a little.

"What am I supposed to be enjoying? What party?" he challenged.

"He's such a killjoy," remarked Bradley to the boys by the doorway. To David, he said, "the one we're throwing for you right now. My brother's apartment."

"Hmm, yeah, you're throwing it right exactly now?" countered David.

Bradley plunged on with his description of the party; "Don't worry, I got the official say so, I know you're a stickler for courtesy or whatever, and he even left a ton of booze for us before he went away for the weekend with his girlfriend." His smile was lopsided and if David didn't know his friend any better, he might be inclined to think him already drunk. "It'll so beat fucking last year."

Between celebrating David's favourite day of the year and the opposing option with complex chemical formulas and depressing drab white walls boxing him in, the decision was obvious. One option, David should take. The other option, he wanted to take. But this was the prime of his life, why waste it on black on white text and the mature decision of going to bed at ten-thirty no exceptions? Why couldn't he go a little crazy with his friends, form memories to last a lifetime? This was his chance to live without fear of the repercussions.

"What the hell," David decided, grinning from ear to ear. "I have a whole semester ahead to worry about chemistry."

"That's the spirit," said Bradley, punching David in the arm again.

"If you punch me in the arm again," David threatened.

"You'd what?"

"I'll beat the shit out of you, that's what."

"Wanna bet?"

A smirk traversed David's face. He shrugged. "Nah. You couldn't catch me anyway." Twisting on the spot, he kicked into a sprint, shot out the door, and pelted down the hallway. Judging by the footsteps behind him, Bradley was hot on his heels.


	2. Chapter 2

Bradley never missed a celebration. He was the spirit of the soccer team. When people asked him why he decided to advance into athletics, he'd shrug and comment on the raging parties players tended to hold. The parties, however, were held by all the other Bradleys in the world, those who loved the immediate satisfaction of sensory pleasures. Truth be told, no athlete protested such pleasures, not even David. And yet, everywhere David looked, he saw no trace of his best friend.

The apartment was a small space, made strictly for one person with its kitchen, living room, and bedroom arrangement. The dim lights provided the perfect backdrop for Bradley's brother's lava lamps to set the scene. The walls were bathed in an eclectic pattern of shadow and orange creamsicle hues. David watched the wall shift from orange to rose pink and back again from his position lounging in an armchair. The party started an hour ago - only! - but forty minutes in, the thought of his chemistry homework floated in through one ear and wrapped itself like a wire cord around his mind. Although his legs swung freely where they draped over the edge of the armchair, all the energy of an adolescent had left with his second shot of "birthday juice". He wanted to talk to Bradley. He was missing the one-on-one connection he usually had when September tenth rolled around and held out hope that a chat with his friend could ease the pain of nineteen years of familial birthday loving he'd had the pleasure of experiencing.

David clapped his hands on the cushions of the armchair and pushed himself up. One thought: _move_.

He moved over to a figure he recognised and leaned against the wall behind her. He waited for her friend to move away, probably to grab more to drink, before speaking.

"Wanna go kick some balls?" he asked.

He was greeted with a look of mild disdain.

"Not unless they piss me off," Courtney said with the smirk of superiority and threat.

"I'm inviting you to the soccer field," said David, throwing up a facade of innocence to protect himself from her threat.

"This is your party, you know." David wasn't sure if she was dodging his question on purpose or actually curious as to why he'd leave his own party.

"Bradley threw it."

"So?"

"Do you see him here right now?"

Courtney craned her head around David to count all the characters in the room, wild and raging (and getting as wasted as they could). Was that all this was? Not a celebration of a birthday but an opportunity to "live it up" as a college student?

"No."

"Soooo, why would _he_ leave?"

"I'm asking why _you'd _leave."

"I didn't throw it."

"You're a mystery, David."

"Is that a 'yes'?"

"My 'yes' is a yes."

"If you don't want to go, just say so," David summed up. He would find someone else, if that were the case. Almost the entire soccer team was here, and he was certain at least one wouldn't mind breaking away from the action to score some goals in a non-game, non-practice setting.

Courtney scoffed. "Are you kidding? For starters, you're one of the only guys who cares to ask me."

David's eyebrows knit together. What was he to make of that? Was it a compliment towards him or a commentary on the gender divide in sports? Should he say 'thank you' or 'I'm sorry'? Before he could settle on something, a small hand fit itself into his and yanked him towards the door. For a second time that night, he found himself running down a hallway, this time in second place.

—

In the middle of the day, getting to the stadium was hell, the roads jam-packed with cars and college students utilising the crosswalks nearly every second of every day. During those times, it made more sense to walk than drive and even that took twenty minutes in its entirety.

That night, Courtney's lead brought them to the stadium in just under ten minutes. With her long legs, David struggled to catch up. When teased, he claimed it was because he had more muscle in his legs weighing him down. Courtney laughed and burst through the back doors no hesitation. The last dwindling caretaker, David knew, was lazy at heart, which meant he never locked the back door by the time he left.

David caught the door in it backwards swing, slipped in, and quietly shut out the world outside.

He turned to head to the field.

When his feet crunched on neatly-kept grass, a wave of relief passed through him. He glanced up to catch a small selection of stars and a full moon above, bearing down. David wondered how much of the space would be illuminated if the stadium lights were shut off, how eerie it might look had the only source of light been a reflective orb thousands of miles in space. He imagined it something like a ghost town.

He jogged to the centre of the field. Courtney already stood there, her right foot planted on top of a soccer ball. David shot a foot out to swipe the ball out from underneath, but she pulled back and watched him stagger to the left.

"Too slow," she taunted. David regained his straight composure to catch her smirk, and suddenly he was a container of nothing but desire. Desire to wipe that smirk clean off her face.

"You wish."

And thus, it began.

It took fifteen minutes of back and forth and all the foot skills in David's arsenal to get within striking distance of the goal. It took another ten before he had a clean shot. Within an hour, he had scored twice and and she also twice. They sat on the sidelines to capture their lungs, wheezing with stitches from their non-stop competition, sweating buckets all over, and hating themselves for rushing out of the party before grabbing a bottle of water.

"Nothing beats this," David mused. His back was to the stadium siding, the wall behind the team benches, and the entire field spread out before him. _A sight which never gets old_.

"Really? I could go for a slushie," Courtney said.

"Allow me to remedy," David said between gasps of air, "one thing beats this."

He caught a smile on Courtney's face before the silence lapsed them into their individual thoughts. Ever so gradually, their breaths lost their weight and insistency.

"You want to go soon?" asked Courtney.

"Leave?" He frowned at Courtney, unsure if she meant leaving the stadium or competing one-on-one again. Secretly, he hoped it was the latter. Despite the time of night and the amount of sweat he had just secreted and how his muscles ached with strain, he was deadset on squeezing as much as he could out of this late night session. _She's good!_ he defended against no one but himself. _Amazing, really._

"Yeah." Her lips twisted ever so slowly into a sly grin, like she was thinking of something mischievous or sneaky for the two of them to do. "I was thinking… hit a bar, dance, get you a proper birthday shot."

David lifted his elbow so it pressed against the back of the bench and leaned his head against his open palm. "I'm only twenty."

"I got you a little something that will help."

David shifted closer.

"It's back at the apartment, of course," she said, "but we can go back, get it, find ourselves in that bar downtown, what's it called?"

"The Lumin–?"

"The Luminence, yeah."

"Courtney," he proceeded with all the built-up seriousness of a draconian headmaster. "Did you get me a fake I.D.?"

"You're one year away. Why wait?"

David's face split into a little smile, but a part of that smile dabbled towards nervous. He wasn't one to break the rules. Breaking rules meant the swift pursuit of justice, and David liked his clean record (and, no, breaking into a soccer stadium late at night didn't count).

"Golden boy David," Courtney teased. She stood and held out her hand. "Loosen up a bit, slip off your golden boy pedestal, try out silver or bronze. You look close enough to twenty-one, the bouncers won't even _look_ at the card."

He glanced away to take a deep breath without an expected stare. Homework or fun, homework or fun. He bit his lip for only a second, then made up his reached out and grasped her hand with his. She pulled him up.

"So," he said, about to verbalise his decision.

"So," she returned. Her expression told him everything she was expecting.

With a resounding boom, the lights of the stadium shut off.


End file.
